Martin Henderson's acting career began when Strangers, a local kids' show in Auckland, came to his school for an open casting call. He joined the cast at 13, and was a regular on two nationwide New Zealand TV series before emigrating to Australia to co-star in more TV shows. One of them was Sweat, a drama about high school jocks co-starring a baby-faced Heath Ledger.

With seven TV series on his résumé, Henderson was 25 when he made his feature film debut with a supporting role in Kick, a rather awful Australian movie about a rugby player who yearns to dance ballet. After that, Henderson moved to America, where he studied at the Neighborhood Playhouse School of Theater in New York, and worked on losing his down-under accent.

Coming to Los Angeles for his first Hollywood auditions, Henderson slept on old pal Ledger's hide-a-bed sofa.

His first American film was Windtalkers with Nicolas Cage, and his first stateside hit was the high-grossing thriller The Ring, where he played Naomi Watts's skeptical ex-boyfriend. He has also starred in the moronic motorcycling movie Torque with Ice Cube, and the Bollywood spoof Bride & Prejudice with Aishwarya Rai.

Like many of Hollywood's trendy stars, Henderson wears the red string of the celebrity Kabbalah religion around his wrist.